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If you're bored with that dratted Rubik cube, then the Nowotnik puzzle is an original concept in computer games that might be just the thing for you. The chances are you'll be tearing out your hair in handfulls trying to solve the puzzle at the simplest level of play, knowing that there are four progressively harder levels to move onto if you ever do manage to get it worked out. "Easy - it's only two dimensional," I hear you say, as I myself commented - until, that is, I had seen the pieces shuffled and attempted a few exploratorm moves. It is indeed a puzzle of merely two dimensions, but don't be under the misapprehension that it is, therefore, a doddle.

At the beginning, and when (and if!) completed, the puzzle is in the form of four large squares. These squares are shuffled by the computer using a random selection of eight possible movements. The problem is then to use these eight movements to get back the four squares in their original layout. At the simplest level, each of the four large squares is broken up into four by the shuffle, giving sixteen smaller squares; at the hardest level, the four squares are each divided into 144 elements, giving a total of 576 elements altogether!

If you complete the puzzle, you are told the number of moves taken, and there is a game save facility so that a partly completed puzzle can be continued, and hopefully finished, later. I would have liked an option to reduce the number of shuffles so that some logical method of solution could be developed by trial and error during the first few tries; the sight of a well-shuffled puzzle on the first attempt is itself rather daunting.

The person who has mastered the magic cube will have a head start in tackling the Nowotnik puzzle. Conceptually, the problem is similar; it is relatively easy to complete one square, or face, but it is solving the whole puzzle without ruining those squares, or faces, already completed that is so infuriatingly difficult.

A very addictive game, and as is so often the case with this kind of competition of self versus the computer, it is very hard to admit defeat and one tends to persist, thinking that a few more moves will have it cracked. Perhaps it is fortunate that the ZX81 is less portable than the cube, otherwise it would undoubtedly make its appearance at parties with the nonchalant admission, by devotees, of the number of moves or time taken to solve the puzzle.

Two other games, routine in comparison to the puzzle but nonetheless absorbing, complete this cassette and make it good value for money.

In Demolition, a wall appears at the bottom of the screen and the object is to knock down as many bricks as possible using a '*' fired repeatedly at the wall. There is a catch - the wall moves upwards at a slightly faster rate than you can knock bricks out, and also more walls appear; eventually the game ends when a wall reaches the top of the screen. Points are awarded for each brick removed, and the total for the game is displayed so that a competition between a number of players can be held. A fast moving interactive game and completely idiot-proof - my four year old daughter played for about an hour without managing to crash the program!

Finally, Tenpin simulates a standard game of tenpin bowling. The alley is displayed at the top of the screen, with score cards for either one or two players displayed below. The game is played over ten frames. When bowling, you indicate the strength of delivery; a stronger delivery is less accurate but increases the number of pins which fall if you make a hit. Not being a tenpin bowling afficionado, I was intrigued by the scoring which apparently is true to life and is coupled with 'strikes' and 'spares'. The graphics are fair; the ball disappears when it hits the pins and the effect as the pins fall and also disappear is rather disconcerting. Nonetheless, a novel simulation to complete the package.

All the games on this cassette require a ZX81 with more than 1K, and each program is duplicated on the reverse side. The programs can all be LISTed, and instructions for making security copies are given. Dr. David Nowotnik, the author of the three programs, is a member of the Aylesbury Computer Club.

The Nowotnik Puzzle And Other Diversions costs £5.00 and is available from Phipps Associates, Mail Order Dept., 99 East Street, Epsom, Surrey.